Page 5 - AsiaElec Week 38 2022

AsiaElec COMMENTARY AsiaElec

Fukushima the tsunami overwhelmed the cir-
culating pumps, allowing the reactor to overheat A new global export market
and generate a hydrogen explosion). While a handful of US and Canadian innova-
It is not just capital costs that are lower. tors have been working on Thorium-fuelled and
Molten Salt reactors use unprocessed Thorium Molten Salt Reactors in parallel with China pro-
instead of the enriched Uranium required by gress in the US has been slow. Financial investors
PWRs. Fuel preparation is both simpler and have been reluctant to commit the multi-billion
cheaper. Fuel does not have to be encapsulated in dollar cost of engineering development, particu-
expensive fuel rods (and equally the costly pro- larly in the US where regulators are intrinsically
cess of removing and reprocessing used rods is hostile to reactor innovation.
also avoided). Thorium also does not have to be One exception is Terrapower, formed and
enriched. Some five times more abundant than funded by Bill Gates and Warren Buffet in 2006
Uranium, the US has a 65,000 tonne ore deposit with an estimated $50m, plus a US govern-
in Montana, while India counts some 800,000 ment grant of $80m. Terrapower has teamed
tonnes in its proven reserves. The fissioning of up with GE to build a 345 MW test reactor (the
just 500 tonnes of Thorium would generate the “Natrium” reactor) at a retired coal power plant
USA’s entire energy demand for a year. in Wyoming. However, while this reactor uses
Finally, and as a bonus, the Thorium fuel molten salts as a way to store heat energy, at its
cycle produces no Plutonium, removing a sig- core lies a solid Uranium-fuelled reactor that
nificant weapon proliferation risk. uses liquid sodium for heat transfer out of the
reactor.
Part of China’s net zero strategy Terrapower’s core innovation is Travelling
In spite of the delay to the startup of its test reac- Wave Fission, a fission process that is designed
tor China’s stated strategy remains to use the to burn depleted Uranium 238 instead of Ura-
knowledge generated by the Wuwei reactor to nium 235, and is fuelled once only at startup, to
build a 370 MWt reactor by 2030 (which should burn for decades, like a giant nuclear candle. Ter-
have a power capacity of around 180 MW). A rapower signed a cooperation agreement with
working 370t MW unit would become a core China National Nuclear Corporation in 2015,
asset in taking China to net-zero (targeted as which fell victim to the Trump administration’s
2050). Along the way MSRs offer the ability to limitations on technology transfer to China.
end China’s dependence on imported LNG and Travelling Wave fission uses breeder neu-
coal – removing what is a significant strategic trons to transform U238 straight into Plutonium
vulnerability. which then fissions to generate heat for power.
China is likely to supply its MSR design to Rods containing raw U238 are shuffled around
whoever wants to buy them. With a large raft inside the reactor using robotics to keep the fis-
of patents and proprietary technology built sion reaction inside the cooling sweet spot, but
up over the past two decades it is possible that the reactor vessel is sealed for decades.
China will achieve a dominant market position Terrapower is also working on the design of a
in MSR supply. MSR power is likely to be both molten salt reactor using chloride salts in place of
financially achievable and politically acceptable fluoride salts. The company announced a $750m
to a wide range of countries who, at present, fund-raise in August 2022, led by SK Group (one
could neither afford nor be trusted with PWRs of South Korea’s largest conglomerates) and Bill
and their flow of produced Plutonium. The Gates. It is not clear whether the amount of the
comparatively small size of commercial MSRs fundraise is inclusive of additional support from
(about one tenth of the size of a normal PWR the US Department of Energy’s Advanced Reac-
build) could make MSR power more accessible tor Demonstration Program, or whether the
to developing economies with limited financial funds raised will be focused on Natrium or a
resources. Project finance will be helped by faster molten salt design.
build times (the equipment will be modular and Natrium uses HALEU fuel (High Assay Low
almost mass-produced), faster licensing (no pro- Enriched Uranium), which has historically
liferation risk) and higher margins. China’s plans been sourced largely from Russia. Last month’s
also include the possibilities of providing com- Inflation Reduction Act included a budget allo-
bined heat and power and of building plant-scale cation of $700m for support to a domestic US
MSRs for specific large industrial sites. HALEU supply chain, including the licensing

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